Business
SET to list 28 global depositary receipts as Thai investors seek overseas exposure
The Stock Exchange of Thailand will list 28 new depositary receipts linked to international stocks and ETFs, covering markets in Asia, the United States and Europe. The move is part of SET’s effort to broaden investment choices for domestic investors and strengthen Thailand’s capital-market competitiveness against other Asian exchanges.
The new listings span high‑growth sectors such as semiconductors, AI, electronics, clean energy, infrastructure, and aerospace. Asian names include Chinese chip‑equipment makers Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment Inc and Hua Hong Grace Semiconductor while U.S. heavyweights Dell, Intel, and Palantir, as well as Europe’s Airbus, are also part of the lineup. This move reflects a broader regional trend of exchanges offering easier access to global blue‑chip equities.
These new depositary receipts aim to provide investors with broader access to global markets, allowing them to diversify their portfolios with greater ease. By linking to international stocks and ETFs, investors can tap into growth opportunities across different regions, benefiting from the economic developments in Asia, the United States, and Europe. This initiative is part of the Stock Exchange of Thailand’s efforts to enhance market offerings and meet the growing demand for international investment options among Thai investors.
Key figures / indicators: 28 new DRs; underlying assets include international equities and ETFs across Asia, the US and Europe.
Why it matters: Easier access to global assets could deepen Thailand’s capital market while allowing domestic investors to diversify without opening overseas brokerage accounts. It also reflects a broader shift in SET strategy toward keeping Thai savings and trading activity within the local financial system as investors increasingly look beyond domestic equities.
Business
(VIDEO) New Video, Black Boxes Show Amazon Jet Floated Past Touchdown Zone Before Deadly Miami Overrun
MIAMI — New video of an Amazon cargo jet floating down a Miami runway, then bursting through a fence and into traffic, has given the public the same picture federal investigators described from the black boxes: a late, fast landing that never settled into a normal stop.
The Boeing 767-300, flying Prime Air Flight 7598 for contractor 21 Air, arrived Sunday from San Juan, Puerto Rico, as storms built around Miami International Airport. Airport and bystander video released in the days since shows the jet remaining airborne well past the usual touchdown zone on Runway 30, a 9,360-foot strip. Tracking data put it still near 130 mph at the pavement’s end. It ran about 1,300 feet beyond the runway, hit a Ford Econoline van carrying a cleaning crew inside the airport, tore through fencing and barriers, struck a Toyota SUV on a public road and stopped in grass, on fire.
Five men in the van were killed: Rolando Aleman Leon, 55; Yoel Rodriguez Naranjo, 53; Julio C. Pineda, 75; Carlos Acosta Fajardo, 53; and Javierkys Reyes Quevedo, 47, the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office said. Two others in the van, ages 79 and 32, were among the most seriously hurt. Five people were injured in all. Both pilots survived. Television footage later showed one of them jumping from the burning aircraft.
National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy called the scene “utter devastation.”
The video answers one question viewers asked at once: Did the jet land long? It did. The recorders answer a harder one: What did the crew do in the last half-minute?
Investigator-in-charge Chihoon Shin laid out the flight-data timeline late Tuesday. About 30 seconds before the recording ended, the nose gear and right main gear touched at roughly 158 knots — about 182 mph, faster than a typical 767 landing. Brakes came on about seven seconds later, slowing the jet toward 168 mph. The left main gear did not plant until about 19 seconds before the tape ended, at about 154 mph. The airplane was not fully on its wheels for a stretch of the rollout.
Fifteen seconds before the end of the recording, Shin said, the brakes were released at about 138 mph and “throttles increased to values consistent with go-around thrust.” Four seconds after that, throttles went to idle and brakes were reapplied at about 135 mph. There was no indication that speed brakes or thrust reversers deployed — the two systems that dump lift and throw engine power backward after a landing.
Aviation specialists who reviewed the briefing said that sequence looks like a late, incomplete decision to abort and climb away, then a return to stopping on pavement that was already gone. The NTSB has not called it a probable cause. Interviews with the two pilots and 21 Air’s chief and assistant chief pilots were set for Wednesday. Cockpit-voice-recorder details had not been released.
The captain was identified as Joseph Carroll (also reported as Carol), 55, with more than 7,000 hours and a 767 type rating since May. First officer Jaime Felipe Silva Molina, 37, had more than 2,500 hours and a 767 rating since April 2025.
The jet weighed on the order of 230,000 pounds. NTSB officials said the payload included more than 32,000 pounds of contact lenses. It was a converted passenger 767. Amazon does not fly the aircraft itself; 21 Air does, in Amazon colors.
Weather is in the file. Storms were near the field. Early video analysis and some experts pointed to a tailwind that would have carried the airplane past the aiming point if the crew did not correct or go around in time. Investigators will also look at speed on final, flare, brake and reverse logic, mechanical condition and why a go-around started and stopped with so little runway left.
The crash shut two of Miami’s four runways on a holiday weekend. It also renewed an old airport question: how much engineered stopway and public-road setback sit beyond Runway 30 when a heavy jet does not stop. Homendy’s team was still working the wreckage days later.
Amazon and 21 Air have not published a technical explanation. The NTSB does not assign blame from an on-scene briefing. What the new video and the boxes agree on is narrower. The airplane used a long stretch of concrete before all three gears were down. Power came up as if for a missed approach, then came back. The devices that should have helped it stop do not appear to have been used. Five workers in a van on airport property never had a chance to get out of the way.
Probable cause, if one is reached, will take months. Until then the pictures do the reporting: a freighter that would not put its wheels down where they belonged, a road that should never have met a 767, and a cleaning crew that was not flying.
Business
MSCI rebalancing on Monday: Adani Energy, Groww set for big inflows; RIL, Jio Financial may face outflows
According to a report by Nuvama Alternative and Quantitative Research, the rebalancing includes additions and exclusions from the MSCI index, along with changes in the weights of several stocks.
Stocks added to MSCI
Laurus Labs, Lenskart, Adani Energy Solutions and Groww are set to be included in the index, which is expected to result in inflows into the four stocks.
Laurus Labs is expected to see inflows of $598 million, while Lenskart could attract $352 million. Adani Energy Solutions is estimated to see $310 million in inflows, while Groww could receive $256 million. The four stocks together are expected to account for total inflows of $1.516 billion.
Stocks excluded from MSCI
Three stocks are set to be removed from the index, potentially resulting in outflows. Balkrishna Industries is expected to see outflows of $169 million, followed by SBI Cards at $143 million and Astral at $138 million.The three stocks together are expected to see total outflows of $450 million.
Stocks with higher weights
MSCI is also increasing the weights of seven stocks, which is expected to bring additional inflows.
Eternal is expected to see the largest inflow at $674 million, followed by Adani Enterprises at $202 million and Adani Ports at $77 million. JSW Energy is expected to attract $34 million, while Adani Power could see inflows of $28 million. GMR Airports and Swiggy are expected to see inflows of $22 million and $13 million, respectively.
Together, these weight increases are expected to bring total inflows of $1.050 billion.
Stocks with lower weights
The rebalancing will also reduce the weights of five stocks, potentially leading to outflows.
Reliance Industries is expected to see the largest outflow at $523 million, followed by Jio Financial at $61 million. Indian Hotels is expected to see an outflow of $32 million, while AB Capital and Colgate could see outflows of $21 million and $16 million, respectively.
The five stocks together are expected to see total outflows of $653 million.
Market outlook for the week
According to Sudeep Shah of SBI Securities, Nifty is trading below all its crucial moving averages. However, most of these moving averages have turned flat, reflecting the lack of a decisive trend amid the prevailing sideways momentum. Momentum indicators and oscillators are also pointing towards continued consolidation.
The daily RSI has remained in the sideways zone for the past 13 trading sessions, while the Stochastic is also oscillating within a range. With momentum indicators failing to provide a clear directional signal, price levels now hold the key to the next move.
This brings the focus back to the crucial support zone. Going ahead, the 24,000–23,950 zone is likely to act as an important support for the index, with the prior swing low and upward-sloping trendline placed in this region. A sustained move below 23,950 could trigger further correction towards 23,700 in the short term.
(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of The Economic Times)
Business
ServiceTitan Slides Nearly 30% After Beat as Soft Third-Quarter Guide Hits Shares Hard
LOS ANGELES — ServiceTitan shares collapsed Wednesday after the trades-software company beat fiscal second-quarter estimates and still told Wall Street the next quarter would be smaller than the last.
The stock traded at $57.32 around 12:06 p.m. Eastern, down $24.27, or 29.74%, from Tuesday’s close of $81.58. Intraday it printed as low as about $55.55. Volume ran many times a typical session. Barron’s, citing Dow Jones data, said a close near $57 would be the largest one-day percentage drop since the December 2024 listing and the weakest finish since mid-May.
The numbers that went out Tuesday after the close looked fine in isolation. Revenue for the quarter ended July 31 was $292.8 million, up 21% from a year earlier and above a consensus near $286 million. Adjusted earnings were 40 cents a share versus 35 cents expected. Platform revenue rose 22% to $284.5 million. Gross transaction volume — invoices run through the system, the company’s proxy for customer sales — increased 17% to $26.8 billion. Non-GAAP operating income was $44.4 million. Non-GAAP free cash flow was $50.5 million. The GAAP operating loss narrowed to $27.6 million; the net loss was $24.9 million, or 26 cents a share.
Then came the guide. Fiscal third-quarter revenue was put at $285 million to $287 million. The midpoint sits under the roughly $288 million FactSet estimate and under the quarter just reported. Full-year fiscal 2027 revenue was raised only a notch, to $1.139 billion–$1.144 billion from $1.130 billion–$1.140 billion, a touch above the Street’s $1.138 billion. Non-GAAP operating income for the year was guided at $152 million to $154 million; for the third quarter, $29 million to $30 million.
That combination — beat the last quarter, miss the next one’s sales print by a few million, and freeze growth in the mid-teens for the back half — is how a software name with a rich multiple loses a third of its value before lunch. Robert W. Baird cut its target to $85 from $101. Other desks still carried Buy ratings and targets clustered near $100, which only underlined how far the tape had run ahead of a one-quarter wobble.
Co-founder and Chief Executive Ara Mahdessian tried to keep the story on artificial intelligence. “Our strong momentum delivering the Agentic Operating System to the Trades resulted in 21% year-over-year revenue growth and over $50 million of non-GAAP free cash flow this quarter,” he said in the release. “Delivering this Agentic Operating System to our customers and leveraging AI to further enhance our organizational velocity are once in a lifetime opportunities to execute against.”
President and co-founder Vahe Kuzoyan said execution on Max, the company’s agentic product, was ahead of plan. “We exceeded our goal of doubling Max locations during Q2,” he said. “As a result of strong execution with existing customers and progress with select new customers, we now expect to end this fiscal year with over 700 enrolled Max locations.” The company said it had doubled enrolled Max sites toward just over 100 earlier in the year and would double again. Research spending rose about 38% to staff that push. Net dollar retention stayed above 110%. Active customers were about 10,800; more than 2,000 book more than $100,000 a year.
Chief Financial Officer Dave S. told analysts the third-quarter step-down had a calendar excuse: one fewer business day than a year earlier. Max revenue, he said, should start to show more clearly in the fourth quarter. He also said the firm’s habit is to beat its own midpoint by $9 million to $10 million when usage and GTV run hot — and that the inverse can happen, which is what occurred in the second quarter’s mix. Incremental margins of 25% are now framed as a yearly floor, not a stretch goal; the company pointed to 33% incremental margins in the current year plan.
Investors heard something else: management is narrowing, not widening. The company said it is concentrating on existing commercial trades and residential roofing rather than opening new verticals, so it can upsell Max instead of chasing logos. A chief revenue officer change traveled with the print. For a platform sold as the operating system of HVAC, plumbing and electrical shops, a CRO exit plus a sequential revenue dip reads as a sales-engine question, not a rounding error.
ServiceTitan exists because those shops still run on clipboards. Founders Mahdessian and Kuzoyan, sons of trades owners, built scheduling, dispatch, invoicing and payments for an industry that invoices tens of billions through the product each quarter. Subscriptions were $212.4 million, up 22%. Usage revenue was $72.1 million, up 24%. Platform gross margin was about 79%. That is a real business. It is also a business whose growth rate is being asked to fund AI headcount while GTV growth cools from the mid-20s toward the high teens.
The 52-week range of about $54 to $120 is the map. Wednesday’s print sat on the floor of that range because software buyers punish guidance that does not compound. A $6 million raise to the full-year sales box does not offset a quarter guided below both consensus and the prior period. Insider sales of tens of millions of dollars over recent months did not help the tape.
None of that makes the beat fake. Cash flow of $50 million and a 21% top line are not distress. They are not the 30% growth the multiple once assumed, either. Mahdessian called the agentic stack a once-in-a-lifetime chance. The market priced the next 90 days as a lifetime of slower invoices. The third-quarter report will decide which reading lasts.
Business
United Natural Foods Guides for Sales to Rise This Fiscal Year
United Natural Foods UNFI -0.55%decrease; down pointing triangle expects profit and sales to rise this fiscal year as it onboards further business from new and existing customers.
The forecast came as the company, a major food distributor for Whole Foods, swung to a fourth-quarter profit despite lower sales.
Copyright ©2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
Business
Apple joins foldable phone race with $1,999 passport-shaped iPhone Duo

Apple joins foldable phone race with $1,999 passport-shaped iPhone Duo
Business
What tariffs will really cost Canadians and Americans
While tariffs can end up hitting consumers in the pocket, there are other impacts on households.
Import taxes can complicate trade for businesses that have cross-border supply. As well as the higher costs, the uncertainty created by the trade war could put off investment plans and stunt job creation.
Saunders suggests the biggest impact on households may not just be through prices, but job losses instead.
“If you’re, let’s say, a bespoke furniture producer in BC [British Columbia], you’re now facing a 50% tariff on your exports to the US – that could really shut the business down. I think that would be more the direct impact on households as opposed to these retaliatory measures.”
Canada’s forest industry employs almost 200,000 people and has called on the government to boost domestic demand through federal housing programs to make greater use of Canadian wood, though it admits “no support package can replace reliable access to our largest export market”.
When it comes to US, consumers are unlikely to see much of a difference in terms of the cost of living as result of this latest battle with Canada, but frictions to trade can have longer-term economic impacts.
Such tensions also feed into concerns over the free-trade agreement between Canada, the US and Mexico, known as the USMCA. Both Canada and Mexico have said they want the USMCA extended for another 16 years, but the US has said it will not renew in its current form.
Despite the deal remaining operational, tariffs risk putting off talks in the near future, creating more uncertainty for cross-border trade.
John Iselin, associate director at the Budget Lab at Yale, estimates the cost will only be about $3 per American household on average, but when taking into account Trump’s wider trade war with the rest of the world, and particularly China, the added costs rise to about $1,000 for the average family.
“It’s hard to view this particular instance with Canada in isolation because we’ve had similar interactions with a range of other countries, all of which makes doing business harder. It’s just another in a series of tariff shocks.”
Business
OneRail launches new AI platform with Nvidia for retailer delivery
Logistics company OneRail is launching a platform using Nvidia‘s artificial intelligence software to help retailers make faster decisions on the most efficient delivery options at scale, CNBC has learned.
The new platform, called OmniStar, allows retailers to use AI to evaluate all of their delivery options and identify the best one for each individual order, using OneRail’s proprietary data.
The last-mile delivery company told CNBC the new platform will allow smaller companies to deliver at scale and improve margins to compete with the retail giants of the world, including Amazon and Walmart.
As e-commerce grows, retailers have had to keep up with surging demand and invest in nimble supply chains to optimize their efficiency. But those manual processes are often fragmented across the retailer and the logistics businesses.
“If you don’t have the ability to make lightning-fast decisions, you’re giving up margin,” OneRail CEO Bill Catania told CNBC. “Last-mile fulfillment is expensive.”
Where choosing the best routing for a package may have previously taken 20 minutes, OneRail said its platform can do it in 2½ minutes leveraging AI. That time saved means retailers can operate larger, faster and more precise supply chains, Catania said.
“That’s where the artificial intelligence comes in. It’s making those kinds of decisions extremely rapidly, and so to do that, that’s where the Nvidia hardware and the software comes in and really makes this thing work at scale,” said David Daeschler, the head of AI at OneRail.
Daeschler said the company began partnering with Nvidia three years ago to explore ways to incorporate AI into the logistics process.
“The result is a real-time decision layer that can route an order to the right carrier and delivery mode at the right cost, rather than relying on static rules or manual planning,” said Azita Martin, Nvidia’s vice president and general manager of retail and consumer packaged goods.
Catania said OneRail’s proprietary data, which includes a network of more than 12 million drivers and over 1,000 logistics partners, is being used to train the AI on the most efficient routes and delivery options.
“It’s for the benefit of them and us: We operate more efficiently. They save money and provide a better customer experience,” Daeschler said.
The company told CNBC its platform has already been deployed with some customers, including a large tire distributor that saw OmniStar save the company a run rate of $40 million over three years because it’s able to use its resources more efficiently.
It’s also estimating the platform will surpass $6 billion in gross merchandise volume in the fourth quarter.
Nvidia’s Martin said the platform will allow retailers to make much faster decisions.
“For retailers, the bigger value is the ability to evaluate more scenarios, respond more quickly as conditions change and improve delivery economics without sacrificing service,” Martin said.
OneRail said the platform could help smaller retailers compete more effectively on delivery speed and efficiency.
OneRail announced a partnership earlier this year with FedEx to bring same-day delivery services to all of its customers, joining a rush of retailers trying to offer their customers the best and fastest delivery options. That partnership will now allow OneRail to better work with smaller businesses as well, Catania added.
“We’re kind of doing for delivery what ChatGPT and Anthropic have done for words – it all works the same way,” Daeschler said. “They give people more access to knowledge. We’re giving people access to being able to do delivery in a way that’s affordable. … That’s all done based on original models, training on data that we have, just like words on the internet.”
Business
Gateway taps investors for $45m
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Business
Treasury announces $6B buyback of 10-year notes and 20-year bonds
Main Street Research chief investment officer James Demmert joins ‘Making Money’ to discuss the economic implications of rising global treasury yields and shifting sentiment in the AI trade.
The Treasury Department on Wednesday revealed that it will buy back up as much as $6 billion in longer-dated U.S. debt in an operation this week.
The agency’s Bureau of the Fiscal Service announced that it will purchase up to $6 billion in 10-year notes and 20-year bonds in an operation. The securities that will be bought in the operation, which is scheduled to occur from 1:40 p.m. to 2 p.m. ET on Thursday, have maturity dates ranging from February 2037 and August 2046.
The buybacks follow Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s announcement that Treasury’s buyback operations would be at least $4 billion until early November, an increase from the $2 billion that the agency would typically buy back in an operation.
Yields on Treasurys have been elevated in recent years due to stubborn inflation, which has been exacerbated by the Iran war and has caused interest rates to rise further.
BESSENT SAYS TREASURY AUCTIONS WILL CONTINUE AS USUAL DESPITE EXPANDED BUYBACK PROGRAM

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced the larger buybacks last month. (Krisanne Johnson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Treasury framed the buyback in its August announcement as intended to “provide greater liquidity support in longer-dated nominal sectors where there is consistent strong sponsorship from market participants, as evidenced by the significant volume of high-quality offers Treasury routinely receives in longer-dated buyback operations.”
Yields on both the 10-year note and 20-year bond rose following the announcement.
The yield on the 10-year note rose to the highest level since 2023, climbing to above 4.85% during Wednesday’s trading session. The 20-year bond yield also rose above 5.3%.
TREASURY YIELDS HOVER NEAR MULTI-YEAR HIGHS AS ENERGY PRICES AND GOVERNMENT DEBT FUEL BOND SELL-OFF

The Treasury announced a $6 billion buyback of long-dated Treasurys this week. (Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Matt Cole, CEO of Strive Asset Management, told FOX Business in an interview that the “market’s calling a bluff because these [buybacks] are very small sizes.”
Cole said buybacks of $2 billion or $6 billion pale in comparison to both the gross national debt of more than $40 trillion and the level of debt issuance that’s expected to continue in the future with annual deficits projected to rise above $2 trillion.
“There’s so much debt out there, and there’s so much need over the next couple of years to issue more debt out there, that the market is just saying this is not enough,” he explained. “I think that’s the signal, and ultimately it’s not going to be fixed if he raises it from $6 billion to $12 billion.”
US NATIONAL DEBT HITS $40 TRILLION MILESTONE FOR FIRST TIME EVER
He noted that most developed countries are facing similar debt problems, while corporate debt issuance is also rising to help finance the artificial intelligence (AI) buildout with yields that are competing with the debt issued by Treasury and foreign governments.
Bessent noted that dynamic in remarks on Tuesday, saying that if markets were concerned about U.S. bonds and default risks, they would be turning to German or Japanese bonds – but that the U.S. bond market has outperformed those.

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh and central bank policymakers will weigh interest rate hikes at their meeting next week. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Cole added that he thinks Bessent and Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh may be the brightest people to hold their roles but are in a difficult spot given the U.S. government’s fiscal position.
“The problem is not them, the problem is a structural debt crisis playing out,” he said, adding, “I think that they should, to the maximum degree possible, be trying to foster a high-growth environment.”
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“I know Bessent talks about trying to grow his way out of it. I don’t think you actually can grow your way out of it. But I do think it’s the best thing to be trying to do, and at worst, you at least help the U.S. not slow down too much during… an industrial revolution in this AI data center buildup,” Cole said, emphasizing the need for the U.S. to compete and win in AI to drive growth.
“Of all the impossible options, that’s the best to try,” Cole added. “I just think that there’s not a path to be successful here outside of stopping spending, and I just don’t think we will do that.”
Business
TikTok, Whatnot livestream shopping gains steam in the U.S.

From a warehouse just north of Chicago, Sarah Potempa – celebrity hairstylist and CEO of the viral Beachwaver hair curling iron – keeps thousands of viewers hooked for hours selling products on TikTok live.
This kind of livestream shopping, which has boomed in China over the past decade, is building momentum in the U.S. thanks to social media giant TikTok and live commerce platform Whatnot, which just reached a $20 billion valuation.
Beachwaver did about $8,000 in sales during the first four hours of a TikTok livestream in late July, which CNBC sat in for. She auctioned off limited-edition curling irons as her teenage son DJed behind her; demoed hair care products; and promised viewers she would shave her brother-in-law’s head live on camera if they sold 500 orders.
It was one of hundreds of livestreamed shows that Beachwaver does each year. About a quarter of its $1 million in TikTok Shop sales so far in 2026 originated from livestreams, where the company hosts its own selling shows and works with affiliate creators on the popular social media app.
Beachwaver CEO Sarah Potempa hosts livestreams from the company’s warehouse in Gurnee, Illinois.
CNBC
Reminiscent of the QVC craze of the past few decades, livestream shopping puts consumers in front of hosts who sell products in real time.
Now, QVC is live on TikTok for more than 200 hours per week across seven channels, according to the company, as it prioritizes digital after recently emerging from bankruptcy.
“QVC is a great example of a large established retailer that might have been seen as a competitor to TikTok shop … but in fact they have turned out to be a really successful merchant,” said Patrick Nommensen, president of strategic initiatives for TikTok Shop in the Americas.
Beachwaver got its start on QVC. TikTok and Whatnot have reinvented the wheel.
“Nobody is saying, OK, you have 10 minutes at 7 p.m. and get ready and here’s your 10 minutes and you’re done,” said Potempa. “You definitely need to be on longer on a digital platform, but you really are more in control of the revenue.”
Beachwaver CEO Sarah Potempa uses the company’s namesake product, a patented rotating curling iron.
CNBC
Following in China’s footsteps
The U.S. live shopping industry is forecast to reach nearly $20 billion in sales in 2026, about 35% higher year over year, according to eMarketer industry estimates.
Still, it’s a far cry from the rapid growth that live shopping experienced in China.
Alibaba introduced Taobao Live in China in 2016. Within five years, the market crossed $50 billion, and it’s projected to top $1.1 trillion in 2026, according to eMarketer.
Live shopping has been increasingly integrated into Chinese “super apps,” which are utilized by millions of users and combine features like social media and messaging in the case of WeChat or artificial intelligence assistance, food delivery and travel booking on Alibaba’s Qwen.
“[Chinese consumers] still like stores, but they use the livestream part of the digital experience as the entertainment, the engagement, the inspiration,” said Globaldata managing director Neil Saunders. “In the U.S., we’ve tended to rely traditionally more on stores to fulfill that role.”
Saunders said that’s changing now as younger consumers lean more into live commerce to discover products.
U.S. live shopping winners
TikTok Shop launched in 2023. The company shared exclusively with CNBC that live shopping sales more than doubled in the first half of 2026 compared with the same time frame in 2025.
The number of live shopping sessions increased by more than 60% during the same period, TikTok said, and total live hours grew by more than 80%.
Founded in 2019, Whatnot built its audience on novelties and collectibles. It’s grown rapidly over the past year, doubling its valuation since October. Whatnot ranked No. 8 on this year’s CNBC Disruptor 50 list, which identifies the most promising venture-backed companies.
Whatnot says it’s the largest live shopping platform in the U.S. but declined to share its domestic sales figures. The company told CNBC that a majority of the $8 billion in global sales it reported for 2025 were in the U.S.
“You can have [5,000], 10,000 people on Whatnot or TikTok watching your show at one time,” said Eric Pagan, who sells for brands on both platforms, during an interview in mid-August. “I did a show on TikTok this weekend that was well into six figures … I think what brands are not aware of yet is that that exists.”
Whatnot’s core focus is auctions, where viewers can bid on products in real time. TikTok rolled out live auctions in January.
“It feels like things are really, really clicking and live shopping is becoming a bit more mainstream,” said Whatnot’s chief revenue officer, Armand Wilson. “In year one, it was largely all collectibles. … Now pretty much anyone can download Whatnot and find something for them.”
Whatnot sellers showcasing Funko Pops on the platform.
Source: Whatnot Inc.
Legacy online marketplaces like Amazon, Walmart and eBay also have native platforms for sellers to host live shopping streams, though those platforms aren’t as inherently video-first as social media sites.
Amazon and Walmart declined to comment about their live shopping businesses, while a representative for eBay Live described the offering as making shopping “more human.” All three companies declined to share livestream sales figures with CNBC.
Mark Yuan, a former business development lead for eBay’s live shopping division and now the owner of e-commerce consulting company And Luxe, said legacy marketplaces benefit from the consumer trust that comes with how long they have been around.
“Those are the things you can’t buy with money, but unfortunately, what gives them the advantage also might be their barriers as well,” he said. “Structurally it’s very hard to transform themselves into a discovery-first or content-first [platform].”
The future of shopping?
Where newer entrants are succeeding is in creating forums for like-minded consumers.
Whatnot, which is especially popular for collectibles, says it prioritizes community and has seen success in areas like Funko Pop figurines, Pokemon cards, sneakers and fashion.
“Going into a community, really deeply understanding their problems and building a product around them has been the ethos that I think has gotten us to where we are today and what really differentiates us” said Wilson.
Pagan, the livestream host, said without the trust of your viewers, “there is no point in even being live.”
“Those people are my friends,” he added. “I believe that they know things about me that a normal person on the street wouldn’t know. And we had those conversations on a livestream.”
TikTok Shop logo on a smartphone.
Costfoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images
Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst at Circana, said livestream shopping helps to bridge the gap between e-commerce and traditional retail.
“You can’t touch and feel the product, but you can hear from others what they think about it,” said Cohen. “[Live shopping] bridges that shortfall of the inability to touch and feel. And that’s always been online’s biggest challenge.”
But the platforms have their own set of challenges. Whatnot and TikTok have had to contend with issues of counterfeit and stolen goods.
For the sellers, leveraging a large platform comes at a cost: Whatnot takes a commission fee of between 4% and 8% of sales depending on the product, and TikTok takes 6% — plus additional payment processing fees.
And, the growing popularity of live shopping has made it harder to compete for eyeballs.
“The biggest challenge really is visibility,” said Globaldata’s Saunders. “You have to make sure that your feed is aligned with the algorithm and that it’s putting you in front of the right people.”
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